


the shape of your name

by princessoftheworlds



Category: Torchwood
Genre: Angst, Future Fic, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-26
Updated: 2021-01-26
Packaged: 2021-03-12 08:48:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 333
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29007804
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/princessoftheworlds/pseuds/princessoftheworlds
Summary: Ianto comes back, only to find that Jack has forgotten him.
Relationships: Jack Harkness/Ianto Jones
Comments: 26
Kudos: 50





	the shape of your name

**Author's Note:**

> sorry

“I _don’t_ remember…” the other man tells him, his blue eyes narrowed, his tone bleeding frustration. “I see you and feel these _incredible_ emotions – love, sorrow, grief, as I have never felt before – but I don’t remember you. I don’t remember _why_ I love you.” He swivels around on the clifftop, his greatcoat whipping dramatically behind him with the motion, just how Ianto always used to tease him for.

“Jack,” Ianto says, nay, pleads. “Stop beating yourself up. You’re human. You may be immortal, but your mind wasn’t made to be. Human memories are fragile. I can’t fault you for not remembering.”

But he wants. God, he wants to.

 _Don’t forget me._ Never could. _A thousand year’s time you won’t remember me._ Yes, I will. I promise. I will.

Jack had lied. He had not meant to – to lie or to forget, Ianto does not know – but he had lied, and he had forgotten Ianto.

And now, Ianto is back. And he has to be the one to remember for the both of them. To remember Torchwood, to remember their team, to remember their life together, to remember _them._

How much can one man, one Welshman, carry? How much can one man _mean?_ Enough to bring back lifetimes’ worth of memories to an immortal?

Can Ianto Jones even do that? He’s always known he’s stubborn, but is he that stubborn? That determined?

“Say something,” Jack says, fixing those intense eyes on Ianto. “Say something…” He trails off, clearly grasping for a name, and the sorrow strikes Ianto again, a painful arrow right to the center of his heart. Jack’s mouth used to intimately remember the shape of his name, used to mouth it onto Ianto’s spine.

“Ianto,” he offers. “My name is Ianto. Ianto Jones.”

“Ianto,” Jack tries, stumbling over the unfamiliar vowels and consonants, and vaguely, Ianto thinks that it would have been better if Jack hadn’t tried his name at all. If Ianto had stayed dead, as he was meant to.

**Author's Note:**

> Find me on tumblr [here](http://princess-of-the-worlds.tumblr.com/) or on Twitter [here](https://twitter.com/rajkumarinik). I tweet and reblog mostly Torchwood with occasionally amusing commentary on nonsense. Please come talk to me and tell me if/how much you like my fic or like ask me about it on tumblr; all my schoolwork has become remote now, and I have limited social interaction.


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